20080313

seaunderthe

Dolphin rescues beached whales.

The Mythbusters examined stories of dolphins fending off sharks from attacking swimmers, and found that sharks actually avoided the bait they left in the water when their mock-up dolphin was nearby. There's speculation either that dolphins really hate sharks, or they really feel some compassion for the sharks' victims.

Scientific American had an article on bluefin tuna possibly going extinct. Given the hype of dolphins caught in tuna nets, I quipped to my coworker that maybe the dolphins were responsible out of self-defense. Then I realized that while dolphins are certainly smart enough to pull off something like that, they probably aren't psychotic enough to do it. Conceiving that one took this human brain here.

Maybe someday we can convince the dolphins we're as civilized as they are.

2 comments:

Sra said...

So long. And thanks for the fish.

But are the dolphins as civilized as the mice?

Zac said...

Just because the mice are hyperdimensional superintelligences secretly performing experiments on us doesn't necessarily mean they're particularly civilized. Though they do have the good sense not to interfere directly with the dolphins.

 
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